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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25469569">this is weeeeeeeird!!!</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/demkhuya/pseuds/yekhuya'>yekhuya (demkhuya)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Silent Hill (Video Game Series)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Canon Compliant, Gen, if something doesnt make sense its probably on purpose ;), this is actually an experiment</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 11:22:24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,006</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25469569</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/demkhuya/pseuds/yekhuya</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>a glimpse into the lives and eileen and henry lead after the events of sh4.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Henry Townshend and Eileen Galvin</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>this is weeeeeeeird!!!</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>- i don't ship eileen and henry, but i think they share a relationship that can't be easily put to words. i do think henry is fond of eileen, but i don’t envision that fondness becoming any more profound than what it is. <br/>- i took a lot of liberties ^^ <br/>- i also hc all the sh 1-4 protags as vietnamese-american. just a note ^^</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>He did not expect Eileen to be the one to contact him first. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They last spoke over eight months ago, when he helped Eileen move into her new place in Portland. Their last weeks in South Ashfield were often spent in each other’s apartments in the evenings after work, not so much because they were especially fond of each other’s company but because they both found it unbearable to be alone at night. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Eileen was first to move out. When they had finished getting her new place together, they took a long walk through the city in the evening. It was summer and, by sunset, the weather became cool and comfortable. They ate at an expensive restaurant overlooking the sea. Neither of them had planned for it. They didn't know, either, how they were able to get a table. Eileen laughed when she saw how underdressed they were compared to the other dinner guests. The sound of her laughter then—bright and carefree—made it seem as though she had thrown all of the past away, and that she would live the rest of her life unburdened. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They exchanged contact information that night as a formality. Henry had the distinct impression that Eileen would not contact him for a long time, if ever. This was not a fact that hurt him. Eileen was strong, generous, and always looking towards the future. He imagined that she would take well to starting anew, and that everything that they had experienced together in South Ashfield would be forgotten. He didn't mind this. Shortly after he helped her settle into her new place, he himself had moved out of South Ashfield to a studio apartment in Boston. And he had resolved not to interfere with her life, as he believed that she deserved better than being obligated to acknowledge the foundations upon which their relationship was formed. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was for this reason that the sound of her voice over the receiver was especially striking. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She had reached out to him very late—four in the morning. He had become used to sleeping irregularly, if at all, and had also become used to spending whole nights awake in his living room, silently sorting through his proofs for work. It happened a month or two after he had moved. He remembered how he spent most of the night waiting for sleep to come—but it never did. His eyes would not close and his mind would not rest. What followed, instead, was the clear and intense sensation of the night surrounding him, stretching into the early hours of morning, engulfing everything in its wake. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>What was strange was that the lack of sleep had never bothered him—not as much as waiting for daybreak. It was a sort of insomnia that did little more than make his days feel twice as long. Unaffected, he now occupied his evenings doing mundane chores or revising proofs. Anything was better than what he felt the first night this sleeplessness had settled inside of him. Always, he would keep every light in his apartment on, only shutting them off when the sun rose. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>That night, the sound of his phone ringing in the early hours of the morning had startled him. But when he heard Eileen’s voice over the line, he felt immediately calm. She spoke quietly, as if there was someone she was trying not to wake. But she sounded well, and not especially surprised that Henry was awake. She asked if he would be able to drive up to see her on the weekend, some time in the early afternoon. There were things she wanted to ask him, but, in her words, the phone lines don’t carry these kinds of conversations well. He agreed before he could ask her what she meant by such a statement, but by the time he had found the words, she already hung up. </span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>He made the drive up to Portland late in the morning, and arrived a little after lunch. It was spring now, and the air was brisk. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Thanks for coming,” she said, grinning openly as she greeted him at the door. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course. You're worth it, Eileen.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>These words seemed to catch her off guard. Her smile didn’t leave her face as she said: “You shouldn't say things like that, Henry. People will think that you mean something else.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, would you drive two hours up here just to see anyone?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If they were good people, I think I would.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But what about a stranger? What I'm saying is that there are a lot of people who often think they're close to you when they aren't at all, and you shouldn't entertain their illusions.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Henry could understand that, but he did not think that he was entertaining any sort of illusion at all: “Are we strangers?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No,” Eileen said, though she sounded uncertain herself, “but it would be a little weird to say that we’re friends, right?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>After that, they went out to a locally owned coffee shop not far from Eileen’s apartment. It was an establishment that attracted a variety of people, unlike those that catered mostly to a university student population. Sunlight filtered through the windows, casting a soft glow across the wooden floors and artisanal decor. Eileen ordered a flat white, while Henry asked for his black. They conversed lightly for about half an hour, each one giving brief, polite updates about their own lives. Eileen herself worked at her friend’s boutique, while Henry relocated after finding work at a local place as a wedding photographer. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They had each settled into their new cities well, and their lives were perfectly ordinary. There wasn’t any need for them to meet again. They could easily have gone the rest of their lives without exchanging another word, but when does the past let anyone go on so easily? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I didn’t think you’d pick up that night,” Eileen said. “I figured you would have gone to bed.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Henry shook his head: “I haven’t been able to sleep through the night for two months now. I’m usually awake doing one thing or another.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Me too. I don’t sleep at all, actually,” Eileen said in an almost detached manner. “I thought that it was just insomnia. But I’m not sleepy or tired during the day. I just don’t sleep. It’s the same with you, isn’t it?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, it is. The night feels so long.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Right? It’s crazy. I used to lie around waiting for sleep to come, but after a while, I realized that I just didn’t need it. It’s that stretch of night, though. Sometimes it’s unbearable.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes, that feeling. It’s strange, it feels as though morning will never come, until it finally does. Even when I had difficulty sleeping at night, I never felt that way before.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They shared a familiar and secure silence, having found comfort in the fact that, once more, they were not alone in their anomalous and inexplicable experiences. Even now, they found it difficult to put to words what it was that had happened at South Ashfield Heights—not because they were unsure of how to approach it, but because they could barely remember. So much of what they had seen felt as though it had taken place in a series of strange and complex dreams. And like with all dreams, their memories of them would fade with time, leaving both Henry and Eileen with only fragmented images that were already near-impossible to recollect. This didn’t mean, however, that they had forgotten everything. Always, in the middle of the night, when there was nothing to be heard and nothing to be seen, they were overwhelmed with a violent paranoia. The distinct sense that they were being watched from afar—that there was something outside of their peripheral vision they chose to ignore rather than confront. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Could you stay over tonight?” Eileen asked suddenly, pushed to her limits by her impatience. “I just want to see what happens. If anything changes.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course,” Henry said. He didn’t even think. Of course, Eileen. You’re worth it. When she heard his response, she gave him a relieved smile. From afar, it would have seemed as though they had known each other for years and years.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Before returning to Eileen’s apartment, the two of them spent the rest of the day sightseeing. There was still a lot of Portland that Henry had yet to see. He had brought his camera with him—his personal Yashica Electro 35–and took many photos of the pier. They went out for dinner, though they didn’t think that they would get a seat at that expensive place over the water again, so they opted for a small Japanese place that was opened between a florist’s and a bookstore. There weren’t any seats on the first floor, so they were brought upstairs, where they were seated by a window that allowed them to look out onto the streets. Eileen seemed to be enjoying herself greatly. She liked watching him take pictures, but stated that she wasn’t any good at taking them herself. I need one of those Powershots, she said. The ones with the screens on the back, so I can see what I’m doing. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But you can use a viewfinder, Henry said. He sounded rather blunt, but Eileen didn’t care. She responded with lightness: that’s true, but you don’t get what you see. You’re used to taking pictures, so you already have an idea of what it’s gonna look like when you’ve got it developed. What about the poor laymen out there, like me? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s not knowing that makes it exciting, Henry said. The results are a surprise.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yes, but like I said, I’m simple. What am I gonna do with a bad picture? It’s a distorted reality, a poor copy of a memory. It’s a waste for me to have a camera in my hands.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Eileen spoke with such animation that Henry found her energy contagious. He smiled somewhat as he responded to her words: cameras don’t promise a perfect copy of what it’s capturing. Maybe you’re making unrealistic demands on it, Eileen. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then what sort of demands should I be making, Henry? she asked, leaning back into her seat. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I’m not in any position to suggest anything, Henry said. But I think you should consider the fact that the images we remember, and the images we want to see—they aren’t always the same. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then I'll consider it, Eileen said. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They visited the florist’s next to the restaurant before going home. She was dating someone now, and wanted to buy a bouquet for her partner. My girlfriend, Eileen said easily. When Henry looked up, she laughed: don’t worry, I’ve told her about you coming. She goes to visit her parents on Saturdays, so you most likely won’t run into her. But if you do, I told her that we went to university together. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They settled for a simple bouquet composed of light, delicate colors and a gentle fragrance. As they walked home, Eileen carried the bouquet in one hand as she led the way. It looked as if he had been the one who bought flowers for her, and they were walking home as a couple. But even this was a transient impression at most. The distance between them as they walked said everything. Not close, but not especially far away, either. It was a fixed and guarded distance that they both respected, upheld, and never brought up. It was enough to come to an understanding. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>By the time they got home, the sun had already set. It wasn’t very late, but it wasn’t like it would matter, since neither of them could sleep anyway. Regardless of whether or not it was night, they were most likely going to stay up anyway. Eileen, however, insisted on making an attempt. She went off to shower and get ready for the night, as if she were absolutely certain that rest would come to her. Henry, on the other hand, had mostly given up. His mind was completely clear, and despite walking several miles the entire day, he didn’t feel the least bit tired. He remembered that period of time he spent locked inside of his apartment in South Ashfield Heights—the way that his body remained in stasis, its status unchanging. He remembered mostly sleeping in the beginning. The initial panic had worn him out. He had slept so much that, awake, he felt as though he were in a dream. But that wasn’t very far off from the truth, in the end. Dream and reality felt so close together in that time that they were nearly inseparable. Even if he could not bring to mind every single memory of that time, he knew that his body had remembered it for him. It was just that, right now, it wasn’t important for his consciousness to recall it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>In any case, this was very much the same problem as before, though the details weren’t exactly the same. Now, his body remained perpetually awake. He decided to occupy himself with a book as he waited around, and took one off of Eileen’s shelf. It was a decently sized novel by Clarice Lispector. He owned one of her novels himself, but hadn’t had the chance to read it. He flipped to one of the opening pages: </span>
</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>
      <span>Now day is breaking, a dawn of white mist on the sands of the beach. Everything is mine, then. I barely touch food, I don’t want to awaken beyond the day’s awakening...</span>
    </em>
    
  </p>
</blockquote><p>
  <span>The esoteric quality of the text kept him occupied for some time, but his consciousness remained completely present. No matter how much he read, it felt as though he would never tire.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Around one in the morning, Eileen left her bedroom and went to make hot milk in the kitchen. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I can’t sleep,” she said, sounding defeated as she held the mug in her hands. She looked up at him and nodded at the copy of Agua Viva that he was paging through. “How do you like it so far?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s hard to follow,” Henry said, straightforwardly. In the handful of hours that had passed, he was able to make it to the middle of the novel, yet he still did not grasp what it was about. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Eileen nodded: “Lispector tends to be like that. Don’t think too hard, though. Just enjoy the ride.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Once she said this, she made her way towards the sofa and took a seat beside him. As Henry continued to read, she took one of his folders that he had set out on the table and opened it up to leaf through the proofs inside. Henry did not seem to mind; either that, or he didn’t notice. With him, it could easily be either.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Isn’t this of Silent Hill?” she said, pulling out a dreamy photo of Toluca Lake. He had a number of six by four prints that were stashed in the corner of the folder pocket, behind the proofs of young couples wearing gentle smiles.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Henry nodded, looking up: “Those are older photos. I used to go there frequently when I was younger.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Have you been back?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Henry shook his head: “To be honest, I don’t really have the courage to go.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” Eileen said, flipping through the photos. “I understand.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her eyes lingered over a photo of what seemed to be a cathedral. There was a strong contrast between the light shining upon the towers and the harsh shadows beneath the delicate arches, giving the image a distant and severe air. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You know, I don’t remember a lot of what happened,” Eileen said, distantly. “And what I do remember, I feel like I need to write down, so that I won't forget. But I can’t bring myself to.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Henry set down his book on the table: “Some things are better left forgotten.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is this one of these things though? Maybe that's why we can’t sleep, Henry. We’ve forgotten something important, and our bodies are working overtime to try and remember.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He had never thought of their situation as being related to what had happened to them. But when Eileen described it this way, it made sense. Perhaps they were atoning for their forgetfulness in their sleepless nights. The truth was that he had forgotten much of what had happened as well. However, it was not forgetfulness so much as it was an inability to remember. It was like there was a wall in his mind that separated him from reaching back and pulling those memories to the surface. Back then, the images came back to him in dreams—vague, blurry dreams that would shock him awake, but leave no lingering impression on his mind. And now, he couldn't dream, even if he wanted to. It didn’t bother him, nor did it affect his everyday life especially, but the fact that even this semblance of normalcy had left his life was alienating. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>What other fact of life would leave them next?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What should we do then, Eileen?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, we should try to remember everything.” She said this with a sigh, as if she had made this decision a long time ago, but remembered that she didn’t have the courage to go through with it. “Don't you have that scrapbook of yours? The one with all of Joseph’s notes? Bring that with you next time, and we can both read through it together. It'll be like going through a dream diary. We can look things up now, too. It’s not like back then, you know.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re right. But I might have to leave that to you. I’m not very good with computers.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, come on. You work with cameras, right? How much more difficult can using a computer be?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She looked at him while resting her chin in her hand, wearing a fairly unimpressed smile. Henry felt as if he had fallen into a trap. He glanced away uneasily, which led to Eileen laughing. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re so easy, Henry.” </span>
</p>
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